I try to log my observing and related activities in a regular blog - sometimes there will be a delay but I usually catch up. An index of all my blogs is on the main menu at the top of the page with daily, weekly or monthly views. My Twitter feed is below. I am also interested in photograping wildlife when I can and there is a menu option above to look at some of my images. I try to keep the news feeds from relevant astronomical sources up to date and you will need to scroll down to find these.

The Celestron 14 is mounted on a Paramount ME that I have been using for about 10 years now - you can see that it is mounted on a tripod so is a portable set up. I still manage to transport it on my own and set it all up even though I have just turned 70! It will run for hours centering galaxies in the 12 minute field even when tripod mounted.

I arrived in Spain at Cabrera at about 9pm on Tuesday evening after a very long journey down from Bilbao following a 2 night boat journey from Portsmouth via the Bay of Biscay.(15th November 2011). The sky was clear and Jupiter was shining like a beacon in the dark sky.

The next day was clear and I was able to start unloading my truck to get ready to set up the telescope.

The optimum site for positioning the telescope was by the swimming pool - a convenient spot at top left.

The following images show some of the sky from that position

The telescope was eventually set up in that position - as it has been raining in buckets since Thursday it is still not polar aligned. This is it undergoing slew testing from my "control room " in the house. This is a convenient corner with two windows allowing me to monitor the telescope and some of the sky! It is controlled by 20 metres of active USB cable with a splitter at the telescope end that connects to telescope control, the SBIG ST9XE Camera (not yet connected) and the TCF focuser. I use the TCF software for focusing as I have been unable to get CCDSoft to accept the connection as yet. I am hoping for a clear night tonight - the latest satellite image below (1400 hrs UT 21st Nov11) does show some gaps but it is by no means certain that I will be able to align the telescope and mount!!

I had a loud welcome from 6 Red Legged Partidges today at the back of the house - one shown below.